My Favorite Pollster Sees Rendell as a Good VP Choice
Terry Madonna and Michael Young, his polling partner at Franklin and Marshall College, have completed a fascinating essay on why Pa. Governor Ed Rendell could be the Vice Presidential choice on the Democratic ticket.
To that, I add that geography is no longer important. Whether its Hillary or Barack, Rendell would bring vitality to that ticket.
I wanted to share with you excerpts from the F and M discussion.
From…….
Politically Uncorrected
By
G. Terry Madonna & Michael L. Young
“The critical benchmarks for that choice are well established: vice-presidential candidates are vetted for their ideological and personal compatibility with the presidential candidate. They must also pass some minimal test for presidential succession, and they must carry with them the electoral votes of their own states.
On all of these grounds, Rendell is a strong contender for the vice-presidential nomination. He is, first of all, a successful two-term governor in a year that virtually all observers believe the number two spot will go to a governor. As Governor, Rendell achieved a substantial portion of his policy agenda in his first term despite having to work with a Republican majority in the legislature.
Equally important, Rendell has great appeal to suburban voters who are now the key electorate in presidential elections. Rendell’s strength in the suburbs has been largely responsible for his decisive Pennsylvania victories. In 2006, he won 70 percent of the vote in the Philadelphia suburbs. And in state politics, Rendell’s suburban popularity has become a catalyst shifting Pennsylvania away from the GOP.
Then, too, Rendell’s extraordinary Philadelphia mayoral tenure provides him with a success story in salvaging the City from fiscal insolvency and resuscitating center city development. Tagged “ America ’s Mayor” by Al Gore, Rendell’s urban policy bona fides are impressive by any measure.
Finally, he is a brilliant campaigner, as even his opponents will attest, who has raised more campaign money than any other politician in Pennsylvania history.
This is an impressive array of political assets, but Rendell brings to the race something even more important: he puts Pennsylvania solidly in the Democratic column. The State is a key in the Electoral College sweepstakes–arguably one of three along with Ohio and Florida that could make the difference in 2008. With Rendell on the ticket, the Keystone State is a slam dunk for Democrats–without Rendell on the ballot it could be dicey.”
Bravo to Terry & Michael for writing that brilliant piece, and, bravo, Larry for having the chutzpah for posting said piece.
On the subject of polls and surveys, one is reminded that there is a category of survey that the traditional news media no longer reports — the annual surveys by Pew, Harris, Gallup and others that track plummeting public trust in the press.
You would not have noticed, but on August 9, Pew Research released it’s 22nd annual survey on the state of the press — trust and credibility among citizens. Even though Pew is a media friendly organization, the numbers for trust in the press continue to look dismal. According to this annual survey, most Americans not only don’t trust the press, they believe that news stories are often inaccurate, the press does not acknowledge mistakes, and does not care about the people they report on! Ouch! Isn’t anybody in the industry paying attention?
In addition, the “internet news audience” (estimated as one-quarter of all Americans) tends to be “younger and better educated,” according to Pew; and they “are among the most critical of press performance.” This is the audience the press should be winning.
In a worthy book titled, “The Elements of Journalism — What Newspeople Should Know and the Public Should Expect,” Authors Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel tell the story of Polish citizens in the days leading up to Solidarity. It seems that, in order to protest the news they were fed, citizens put their television sets in their front windows and turned on the sets when the evening news was broadcast. In effect, they turned their back on their news providers.
If Press principles such as “sunshine” and transparency do not apply to the practices of the press — then they are mere platitudes. Like every other “estate,” the press must lead by example.
Mike– You are preaching to the choir on this one. And our business is not helping the public perception of our integrity. Between “spinning,” the efforts to be first instead of accurate, and extravagant examples of subjective reporting, we are leaving the door open to a time when readers and viewers will continue to shrink.
Yepper…Fast Eddie as Veep…of course he will have lots of “splainin’” to do about his old pal, Hsu..yeah the guy who is a fugitive from justice..yeah, Hsu, the guy who spoke on the phone with Fast Eddie…yeah the guy whom Fast Eddie didn’t bother to urge to give himself up…seems to me maybe Hsu was a “sleeper”…he certainty spent alot of money in cultivating and gaining the “trust’ of public officials throughout the USA…and Fast Eddie says “the guy never asked for a job or a contract, or even an invite to a wedding”…right Mr. Governeor, the bill hasn’t come due yet…and the mailing of the bill was interrupted by Hsu’s arrest, duh.